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<title>Ātetenga (resistance) by kyber-erso (aoraki)</title>
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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27397585">Ātetenga (resistance)</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/aoraki/pseuds/kyber-erso'>kyber-erso (aoraki)</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Keep me Warm [5]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Gen, Injury Recovery, M/M</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-11-05</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-11-05</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 20:40:22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Graphic Depictions Of Violence</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,138</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27397585</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/aoraki/pseuds/kyber-erso</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>"Trust in the force, dear one." The man's eyes were soft, earnest. "For me, if not yourself."</p><p>Obi-Wan is severely injured after the events of TPM. Qui-Gon helps him recover.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Qui-Gon Jinn &amp; Obi-Wan Kenobi, Qui-Gon Jinn/Obi-Wan Kenobi</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Keep me Warm [5]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1996870</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>57</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Ātetenga (resistance)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p><em>Obi-Wan tried to remember what stability felt like</em>.</p><p>His hands shook constantly, grip wavering and unreliable. The tea ceremony, once a religiously precise process, had become deluged with spilt leaves and bitten back tears.</p><p>The delicate span of his wrists were braced, providing support to the laminanium winding around the bend of his fingers. It was all the technological genius the Jedi Order could afford, but the damage to his body was resilient. It was never enough to still them completely. Adjusting the wool sleeve of his cloak to cover them had become compulsive.</p><p>He often held his saber, just to feel the vibration of the kyber against his numbed flesh of his palms. The weapon had not flared azure since that fated day on Naboo, the young knight hardly trusting himself to avoid further injury. In these moments he felt the weight of his master's gaze on him, and he knew he did not trust him with it either.</p><p>Migraines, as swift and violent as a sand storm, would debilitate him. None of Healer Che's remedies could lessen the effects - all he could do was breathe through the pain. During those times, the feeling of his Master's hand clasping his own, slick with sweat, binding, felt like his only tether from despair.</p><p>Every evening Qui-Gon would settle him by the sitting room window to saturate in the setting sun. Together they would channel the days fading energy into his hands, bringing life deep into nerves deadened from lack of oxygen. Qui-gon insisted that they were making progress, that in time all will be well.</p><p>Obi-Wan was grateful for the freedoms this ritual allowed him - to eat and function without constant dependence. But he would never fight again. To stand alone was nearly impossible without his master beside him. His future was uncertain, a yawning, carnivorous void - the fear of it made his master's lies easy to consume.</p><p>Qui-Gon persistently assured him that he wasn't a burden, but it was difficult to not feel as such. Not when the young knight found himself prone on the floor, struggling not to vomit from the pain in his hands, in his mind - useless and vulnerable.</p><p>"Where is Anakin?" Obi-Wan would gasp, and his master would have to remind him again and again and again-</p><p>"I'm sorry," he would weep, the pressure behind his skull excruciating, the guilt even more so, at least until a cool hand would press over his eyes, seeping relief into his bones.</p><p>He had lived his whole life with nightmares, often in the form of confusing premonitions. To wake silently was a skill he had mastered in the creche. But now - they were horrifying in their fragmentation. The neurons in his brain were not able to connect as they once did to add coherence to the visions. The future was a jagged edge, his injuries a shatterpoint. In one moment he was witnessing his master on a pyre, the next it was his own flesh that was burning.</p><p>The worst nights involved Naboo. The sith and his all encompassing darkness, his master's singular focus <em>the boy the boy must protect the boy</em>, and the sickening fall off a platform edge. Blood, disgust, the stink of terror, <em>his blood</em>, sleeping into the tunic of his back, feeling as though his brain had spilt from his skull and his hands oh force <em>his hands</em>-</p><p>
  <em>Obi-Wan tried to remember what stability felt like. </em>
</p><p>He had grown accustomed to spending dawn bent over the fresher unit, his master pressing peace between his shoulder blades, soothing voice murmuring nonsense to him as he retched. <em>You're here now, with me. You're here... </em></p><p>Most of the time he felt as if recovery was like swimming through molasses. But as the weeks progressed, it was easier.</p><p>A month after Naboo, his master assisted him on his first excursion from their rooms. The short journey to the gardens had exhausted the knight. Irrational shame crept up his neck at the each passerby that would slow to glance at the Sith Killer and his ailed, former apprentice.</p><p>They followed pathways he had traversed as a child. When he closed his eyes against the daylight, he could see himself - Bant and Garen and Siri volting through the foliage, limbs light and loose and entirely under their control. <em>Release it</em>. His master's voice, encouraging out the air that had caught in his lungs.</p><p>Qui-Gon led him to the shoreline of the largest lake, removing his own boots and cloak before approaching where Obi-Wan rested. Larger hands began to push the heavy wool from his shoulders. Obi-Wan caught the sleeves before they could fall, hesitating, extremely aware of the beings around them. He didn't want them to see... but his master's eyes crinkled with warmth, and their bond flooded with reassurance, so strong the life forces near them became but distant stars from the brightness of it.</p><p>Obi-Wan let the older man remove his cloak. He closed his eyes as the wool passed over his palms, prickling anxiety creeping into his blood. Qui-Gon knelt to undo the straps of his boots, laying a steadying hand on his flank as he removed them. He was too good. Obi-Wan could hardly bear it, choosing to bite down hard on his lip rather than voice his gratitude.</p><p>His master's hands encompassed his own, warm, forgiving of the braces holding him together. Without looking away, his master drew him into the water.</p><p>His tunics were sodden immediately, woolen tabards swirling around his hips as they continued into the lake. As the water enveloped them, the pressure on his joints lessened from the buoyancy. With it brought with it an audible sound of relief. He hadn't felt so unencumbered since... for a while.</p><p>His master's grip loosened and he couldn't fight back a brief moment of panic, his feet weren't touching the lake floor, and he didn't have faith in his body to hold off the deep.</p><p>"Master-" his hands clumsily clutched his master's wrists, fingernails digging into skin. "I-"</p><p>"Trust in the force, dear one," the man's eyes were soft, earnest. "For me, if not yourself." Qui-Gon pushed away from him, not far, but enough to leave the young man out of reach.</p><p>Obi-Wan grasped at courage, willing his body into motion. A starburst of joy expanded his chest when it responded, like he was whole again. He didn't need dexterity to swim. He didn't need it to <em>live</em>. The truth of it all was so obvious and blinding he couldn't help the laugh that bubbled out from within.</p><p>If they hadn't been connected in the force, Qui-Gon would have been concerned at the hysterical edge to it. But he understood, he always did.</p><p>Obi-Wan remembered what stability felt like - the force. The warmth heralded by the light of his master's smiling eyes.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Nanoo. Thank you Pararara &lt;3<br/>Not so happy with this one, but persistence is key, right? Kia kaha whanau</p></blockquote></div></div>
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